The Three Tattvas /Principles of the Yin Yoga Practice
Yin Yoga just from an appearance sake seems to look like a “simple” practice. As my Yin Yoga teacher Bernie Clark always says, “its a simple practice, but it’s not easy.” With knowing the principles also referred to as tattvas, it can help you understand and know how best to practice this style of yoga (1).
One quickly learns that the practice isn’t easy from their very first experience of a Yin Yoga class. As time comes into play, you soon realize it’s hard to hold postures in stillness. This could be due to the fact that you’re new to Yin Yoga and your body and tissues are just not used to longer holds. Or the other reason may be you’ve gone into the pose too quickly or too deep and your body feels more pain or discomfort than it should. Another reason may be due to your unique anatomical make up, as human variation means we aren’t all made equal. This may be preventing you from being able to do certain postures, holding for longer and/or looking a certain way in a given posture. Know that this is okay, and that each Yin Yoga pose has variations, but some may not be right for you. The principles of this practice will help you navigate this.
The Art of Being Still - Yin Yoga
The reasons I list above are all physical, but if you don’t typically practice “the art of being still”, stillness itself may be a challenge and not just for the body, but also for your mind. I refer to Yin Yoga as “the art of being still”, because it’s not something that comes naturally to people, including myself. My introduction to Yin Yoga was not easy. I didn’t like the practice right away. I understood the concept of staying still holding poses. But what I didn’t get was what else came up during the practice. The mental stuff was the hardest.
Challenges
I was always on the go, busy work wise, with plans with family, meet ups with friends to teaching yoga, lots on the go with work, working in the corporate world full time and then my passion projects etc. all I can say to sum it up, is that it was BUSY. So when everything STOPPED, literally due to physical stillness, like the Yin Yoga practice encourages and teaches us, the mental stuff that came up was way harder to be with, sit with and deal with. The quiet nature of the practice didn’t mean my mind stayed quiet.
The tension both physical and mental, I was holding all came to surface. I noticed things more as I was guided to become aware of sensations, what and where I was feeling it, how I was moving in and out of poses and what came up mentally. The challenge of noticing what arouse. The physical stillness didn’t necessarily mean mental stillness; and the movement of energy throughout the body and how I felt after the practice was enough to keep me coming back. I felt relaxed, energized post class, lighter. I became intrigued and wanting more of Yin Yoga, as it became a means and tool to help me avoid burnout, headaches (both migraines and tension), and accumulated tightness and tension I felt in my body.
Meditation with Yin Yoga
Yin Yoga very much encourages meditation, for us to be a witness to our experience, as we sit and notice things that are coming up for us while we hold postures in relative stillness; physical sensations, we notice where our thoughts go, very much observing those fluctuations of our minds, and noticing even the emotions that come up during. How we feel holistically comes to light.
Why the Tattvas/Principles?
It is important when practicing Yin Yoga to understand the principles to best approach this practice. Especially if you’re new to the practice.
Know how to truly be attentive and know the intention of what we are doing.
If one approaches the practice with EGO in mind, one quickly learns that is where the practice is the hardest and that it’s NOT necessary to push, as this can lead to injury and not being able to hold postures for as long. Therefore you can’t fully experience what the practice has to offer, with longer holds.
“Practice with intention and attention”
Bernie Clark
Yin Yoga teaches us and provides us with more knowledge of knowing how to truly listen and pay attention to what your body and the sensations and signals that arise. Like my teacher Bernie Clark says practicing and knowing the intention too, of WHY we are doing something, is important, he always says in his classes, “Practice with intention AND attention.” This Yin Yoga mantra, sort of speak, helps us on top of the three principles, to best know how to practice.
The intention being Yin Yoga works the deeper connective tissues (fascia, joints, tendons, ligaments), whereby most floor based postures are held in a passive and safe way. Approaching the Yin Yoga practice with attention to this intention helps us become of aware of what is safe stress for our deeper connective tissues and body and what is not safe.
Avoiding pain is important in this quiet and still practice. We will review what the differences between okay sensations and not okay ones like pain are. In order to avoid pain one must learn primarily how to listen to the body’s signals. We do this by paying attention.
Awareness is something that may not come easily for some. It does take practice, to listen to truly be a witness and pay attention.
Below are the three principles to be aware of when practicing Yin Yoga, which in turn teach you about awareness and how to best pay attention.
You’ll quickly learn Yin Yoga is about what it feels like for you, as you are your inner guide. No one can be inside your mind or body to understand what something feels like pain vs. discomfort we can be with. Only you can.
Yin Yoga teachers are there to help guide you to a deeper knowing within yourself. Yin Yoga is very much a practice with a functional approach, as our human variation is so unique, as taught by Paul Grilley and my teacher Bernie Clark (3). It’s not about the look of a posture its about what it feels like. Approach your practice with attention, while at the same time understanding the intention and you’ll quickly learn what the practice has to offer.
The Three Tattvas/Principles: Edge, Stillness, and Time.
First Tattva / Principle - Edge
Edge is the first principle of Yin Yoga. When we talk about edge it relates to how deep we go into the pose. Not how someone else does, but you. We gradually move to an edge which can be called our first edge, as long as we feel either tension (slight pulling) or compression (body meets body), dependent on the pose, then we are doing the posture.
Feeling something in the targeted area, means you’re doing the pose.
Slowly with time the third principle, we eventually move to a new edge or like Bernie Clark calls it, we are constantly “playing our edge”. When we hold postures in stillness and for longer times, our edge changes as the body slowly opens and maybe offers more space for our body to move into a new edge. ”Playing the edge” naturally go to where the body stops you, with time body opens and you’re invited to go deeper. (2).
Assessing our Edge(s)
There is that saying in Yin Yoga coined by Bernie Clark, “the goldilocks position”, which helps us assess where our first edge is and when we are ready to move into our next edge or maybe even out of the edge you were just in. We go into the pose not too far at first, until we feel something, but we don’t want to feel too much sensation, or feel nothing at all. We want that just right position where we feel something but not an intense sensation where we can’t hold in stillness, or we stop breathing calmly or maybe we want to get out of the pose after only a few seconds. These are all signs you’ve gone too far too soon. Pull back, start slow and move into the place where your body again feels something, but not too much.
When playing our edge we need to understand when assessing our edge, what is the difference between pain and the feeling/sensation we want.
Firstly, the feeling we want is a dull achy annoying feeling, we either feel tension (stretch like feeling, like skin pulling, muscles stretching apart) or we feel compression (when the body meets the body). The feeling we do not want to feel is PAIN! As soon as we feel pain come out of the pose immediately.
Pain, is your body’s way of telling us ouch this hurts, it may be lead to injury, not right away, but with repeated stress or ignoring these signs and sensations injury will eventually come. Pain can feel like (this is not an exhaustive/inclusive list of all pain signals); pinching, stabbing, numbing, stinging, warming or sharp sensations.
Practice with attention to know if you feel pain or dull achiness when approaching and playing your edges in your practice.
Next principle, stillness, and why is it important to be still?
Second Tattva / Principle - Stillness (or more like relative stillness)
Find relative STILLNESS. Which means to not move, but with some exceptions in mind; pain free experience and coming in and out of the posture as we play our first principle, edge!
Just become still in the pose, like Bernie Clark my teacher says, but know it is okay to go deeper as we are playing our edges, but always keep in mind without pain. If we feel pain, stop and come out. We want to be pain free so we can hold for time. Time is the magic ingredient, with the stress we apply to our yin tissues, time allows these tissues to adapt to the stress (3).
Stillness helps with the deeper connective tissue release, as these tissues, the fascia, tendons, ligaments and joints, require longer holds to adapt and grow stronger.
Relative stillness comes into to play, as you assess your edge and play your edges, you come out if you feel pain. Stillness is not absolute, once your still you aren’t supposed to stay that way, you’re slightly moving into a new edge as you constantly are assessing and playing those edges. Maybe even coming out of the pose sooner than the teacher or timer might say and/or not hold in stillness in order to avoid pain and prevent injury. This is why paying attention is important.
As you hold postures in stillness the edge of pose may change with time. How?
Well, the body opens, pose may deepen past your first edge, and then you try to move into a new edge. With gravity, our breath, and time the tissues start to change. The tissues in the body slowly release and allow more space for you to possibly go into a deeper and deeper expression of it, but remember over time. Keep noticing sensations, as pain may come in, so you either back out of the edge you just entered or come out completely. Relative stillness is again not absolute or a prescription. Remember practice with attention and you’ll be able to spot the signals of pain and/or appropriate sensations.
Time is that element, which we will get into shortly here, that can occur after a few minutes of holding but possibly even after weeks or years of practicing, the body finally opens. But keep in mind as we work in stillness, sometimes we strive to a new edge but our anatomy is stopping us. Something Paul Grilley is passionate about teaching and sharing how yoga is about a functional model vs. a critical alignment focused one. Functional model meaning we are able to do certain postures due to our unique anatomical make up and we aren’t able to do others, human variation is key to this approach, we aren’t made equal (5).
As you hold in stillness, check in and practice with that attention to be aware, can I move into a new edge. Notice how your edge changes…and with time change can occur. Let’s get into why the principle of time is important…
Third Tattva / Principle - Time (the magic ingredient)
With the two other principles in mind, find your first edge, holding postures in relative stillness and for TIME. How much time? Well in Yin Yoga poses are held much longer than any other style of yoga.
Yin Yoga poses are held average between 3-5 minutes or sometimes longer, the longer you practice Yin Yoga, the longer you may be able to hold postures as your tissues adapt. One of my favourite poses, Sphinx pose can be held for 10 minutes, but maybe not when you’re new to the practice.
Time allows our muscles to relax as we hold in relative stillness, playing our edges, and our body along with gravity allows us to sink into deeper tissues (2). Our deeper connective tissues need TIME to get into as the muscles take about a minute or so to relax. Once the muscles relax we get into the deeper layers of the body, past those muscles.
Time also allows us an escape from the busy hustle culture life we are living these days, literally creating physical stillness where we observe and pay attention to what arises, encouraging us to meditate, be still and calm or minds.
The above three principles are when we are coming into the poses and holding them, BUT let’s move onto the next principle that is sort of unwritten, but is encouraged by all Yin Yoga teachers to keep in mind when coming out of a pose that’s been held for time…
The “Fourth” Unwritten Principle - Come Out Slow-mo
The body becomes stiff and vulnerable after holding any given postures in stillness and for time. I always say in my classes come out of a long held Yin Yoga pose SLOW MO; slower than you think you should or want to, really listen and move with intention, to be able to notice your body giving you signs, signals and sensations.
Come out, slo mo, is something I say to my students so that they can avoid potentially hurting themselves, as the body becomes vulnerable from long held postures.
To help explain how slow mo should work. Think of yourself like you’re moving through molasses, as most people interpret moving out of a posture slowly, differently. Some may just move out of the pose too quick, as they may have pushed themselves too far in the pose and something went numb and they think coming out abruptly is the way. OR maybe they’re new to the practice and over did the hold and should’ve come out sooner, and due to the lack of experience they weren’t used to the ‘art of being still’ and what can arise, they let EGO get in way and held too long.
You’ll quickly learn if you’ve held something too long and went beyond your edge. Your body will tell you.If not during the pose, maybe shortly after coming out or later that day or week. But keep your attention and intention in mind, even after you leave your mat.
My teacher Bernie Clark says it may feel like you’ve aged 5-10 years coming out, and that’s quite normal and means the practice is working. And to keep in mind that coming out SLOWLY does not mean fast (3).
This is why I like to say come out SLOW MO, as everyone generally knows what that looks like, like that scene out of a movie where someone is running really fast, and all of a sudden the slo mo happens, you watch with seeing every detail of their facial expression, movement and limbs moving so slow.
Practice with intention and attention
I hope the explanations above of the principles of Yin Yoga will help you navigate in your journey and experience on what the still, deep, quiet and introspective practice has to offer.
Practice with intention and attention as knowing the why of the practice and noticing what arises in our Yin Yoga practice helps us avoid pain, stay practicing for longer to help keep the deeper connective tissues strong, body mobile and overall bring back harmony into our life. A sort of holistic approach to living.
Happy practicing, check out some resources i have below to help understand these concepts more.
Namaste,
Marzena
“KEEP IN MIND PEOPLE LIKE TO DO WHAT THEY LIKE NOT WHAT THEY NEED.”
Sarah Powers
SOURCES
Info taken from The Complete Guide to Yin Yoga (Bernie Clark, 2012) Yinyoga.com
The three principles of Yin Yoga video by Bernie Clark https://youtu.be/RgsYVGvxKQI
The three principles of Yin Yoga explained with Butterfly pose video by Bernie Clark more recent, 2021 Youtube Video https://youtu.be/OTmhNbcOlJg
https://pranamaya.com/the-functional-approach-and-yin-yoga-my-day-with-paul-grilley/